


The Bourne Heritage

by tirsynni



Category: Bourne (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Ignoring Last Two Movies, Slight Kirill/Bourne
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-11
Updated: 2019-06-11
Packaged: 2020-05-01 17:47:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19182721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tirsynni/pseuds/tirsynni
Summary: Jason Bourne was the stone which started it all. It was everyone else who turned the ripples into a storm.





	The Bourne Heritage

**Author's Note:**

> I adored the Bourne movies and started reading the books, but I wish they had continued with their worldbuilding.

It started with Jason Bourne, but it didn’t end with him. He was the stone in the water and it wasn’t until the ripples became waves large enough to sink ships that he noticed what he began.

When he vanished, whispers arose. Some presumed him dead, but most scoffed at the idea. The whispers centered around something far more scandalous: had Jason Bourne gone rogue? Clever and deadly and  _ loyal _ , the CIA’s well-trained, lethal hound. Mere weeks later, Bourne’s return hit their world like a nuke. Jason Bourne had done more than gone rogue: he had shattered his collar and turned his teeth against his masters. Operation Treadstone and all like it shuddered, their cracks clear for all with eyes to see.

For two years, Jason Bourne vanished again. The whispers didn’t stop, even if they quieted. When he emerged again, the CIA’s dog-turned-wolf, they rose again, the breeze before the hurricane.

Kirill didn’t realize it until months later, but he was one of Bourne’s ripples. Somehow Bourne survived his shot: the first ever to do so. That wasn’t the ripple. That was the shadow, Bourne transforming into something more than human. No. The ripple emerged when Kirill opened his eyes, blood coating his eyelashes, and stared down the barrel of Bourne’s gun. Kirill saw his death, the expected end of his story…

Then Bourne lowered the gun and walked away.

When Kirill recovered, he didn’t go back to the FSS. He slunk to the shadows and kept his ear out for whispers. It took no time for his name to join them.

Knowingly, willingly, Paz joined the whispers. He heard them and they echoed in his mind when he went after Bourne. He sought Bourne fully expecting to die. It wasn’t personal. It never was.

Except Bourne put down his gun and walked away. The easiest of kills, the job accomplished, and Bourne left him alive.

When the time came, when Bourne was at the end of  _ his _ barrel, it was Paz’s turn to not fire. Bourne’s words answered nothing and everything: "Look at us. Look at what they make you give."

Paz didn’t fire but Vosen did. Paz knew it didn’t matter. The news declared it for all to hear: Jason Bourne’s body was never found. Jason Bourne was still alive.

Knowingly, willingly, Paz became another ripple. He slipped into the shadows and when other assassins emerged, from Treadstone and Blackbriar and all those the government created and subsequently burned, Paz helped them escape. He killed when necessary but discovered that, for many, all they needed was a lowered gun.

Internal and external investigations helped. The US Government and its counterparts tried again and again to create new Treadstones, but the names were out there now: Jason Bourne and David Webb. Assassin, killer, tool, weapon, victim, monster, boogeyman. Symbol. It depended on who asked.

When the government tried to quiet the ripples, to hush dissenters and distract the news, Nicky Parsons and Pam Landy were among the first to fight: Parsons without and Landy within. Attempts to silence  _ them _ failed, Parsons and Landy quick to use their government-taught skillset against them. When that wasn’t enough, the ripples rose, bullets on their waves and Bourne’s name in the wind.

The ripples expanded. More operatives were always found, patriots willing to kill for their countries, but many others found themselves splashing in the water, rocking boats and lapping at the shore. Nicky Parsons, Pam Landy, and Paz were among the first ripples, eyes on the horizon, but they weren’t the last. Around them, ships sank and empires crumpled.

Two years after Bourne walked away, Kirill found him again, a drink in hand and eyes on the ocean. His other hand was conspicuously out of sight, but Kirill wasn’t afraid. His own drink damp against his palm, Kirill walked up to him and sat beside him. Bourne eyed him but made no move to shoot him. Kirill knew he wouldn’t.

Kirill didn’t tell him of the revolts he had started. He didn’t tell him that his influence extended beyond the United States into the heart of Russia itself and beyond. He didn’t tell him of the suicides -- real and faked -- of those who tried to replicate Operation Treadstone and failed. 

Kirill looked at him and saw more than endings in Bourne’s tired, solemn eyes: he saw  _ beginnings _ .

“To new beginnings,” he toasted quietly, raising his glass.

After a heartbeat, Bourne raised his own. Their glasses  _ tinked _ together. “To new beginnings.”

Bourne was the beginning, even if he didn’t truly realize it. He was far from the end.

**Author's Note:**

> Check me out on [tumblr](https://tirsynni.tumblr.com/).


End file.
